


Cuckoo

by Razzaroo



Category: Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-25
Updated: 2015-08-25
Packaged: 2018-04-17 06:30:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4656198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Razzaroo/pseuds/Razzaroo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tiberius Blackthorn has always known he's different</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cuckoo

" _Cuckoo._ _ **/ˈkʊkuː/:**_ _(noun) a long-tailed, medium-sized bird, typically with a grey or brown back and barred or pale under parts. Many cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of small songbirds_ _."_

Do cuckoo chicks know they're cuckoo chicks? Do they know that the birds that feed them and raise them are not their parents? If they do, when do they realise it? Is it after they hatch? Is it when they're ready to fly the nest and lay their own eggs? Is it when they grow bigger than their parents, greyer than their parents?

Tiberius still doesn't know.

He doesn't look like his siblings; he knows that. They all look like his father, especially Julian. They have his brown hair and blue eyes and his lean build. Even Helen and Mark, who everyone hates, look like him. Mark has his father's jaw, his father's nose, the same shape to his shoulders; Helen has his eyes, the shape of his mouth and when she smiles, she has a dimple on the one side the same way he did.

Not that he'd admit to looking, but Tiberius has yet to find anything in his face that resembles Andrew Blackthorn.

He looks like his mother. He has his mother's grey eyes and black curls; he has her mouth and her eyebrows and her smile. She'd always used to say that she'd made him all by herself and that was why he looked so much like her; when he'd corrected her, telling her that was impossible, she'd just smiled and told him it was a joke she'd had with his father when he was a toddler.

"  _Changeling._ _ **/ˈchānj′lĭng/:**_ _(noun) 1. A child secretly exchanged for another. 2. In European folklore, a fairy child left in place of a stolen human child."_

The word changeling had been thrown at him on his first time in Idris. He'd been seven years old at the time, one hand in his father's and the other holding on to Mark's sleeve. He remembers how his father had gripped his hand and Mark had said something that had earned a reproachful " _Mark Antony!"_

Later, his father had bought him ice cream and told him to take no notice of what anyone else said; he's a Blackthorn and he belongs, no matter what anyone else said. It had taken Tiberius a couple of years to realise that the word changeling had been used because of the way he navigated the world, not because of how he looks.

" _Similar_ _ **/'sĭm′ə-lər/: (**_ _adjective): Having a resemblance in appearance or nature; alike though not identical."_

As he gets older, Tiberius does begin to realise the similarities between him and his family. He laughs like his uncle, slightly wheezy and from his chest and throat more than his belly. He has the same hands as Mark, which must mean those come from his father. When he concentrates, he sticks his tongue out of the corner of his mouth the same as Drusilla and his smile quirks up more on the left side like Julian's. When the sun catches Octavian's eyes in the morning, they light up grey more than blue.

He wishes he could go back and tell his younger self this, so he could throw it back in that Nephilim's face when they call him "changeling." But he knows that time travel is out of even Malcolm's reach so he doesn't linger on the thought long. He learns every rune by heart and he practices his Latin and writes to Helen and Mark every morning.

He doesn't look like his siblings and he knows it. He doesn't navigate the world like they do and sometimes he resents it; it's so easy for them but he's finding his own ways to manage it.

A cuckoo chick may not know that it's a cuckoo chick and Tiberius may never know if they do, but he knows that he's a Blackthorn and that he belongs. Knowing that, he doesn't need to care about cuckoo chicks and changelings and what other people think of him. It's enough. It will always be enough.


End file.
